This invention relates to a method for liberating meat from slaughtered animals, and to a press for separating meat from bones.
It is known, in particular for larger animals such as cattle including cows and hogs, to cut large pieces of meat with bones therefrom, to debone said pieces by hand or by machines and to use the meat for human consumption, after suitable treatment of the meat such as salting, curing, cooling, boiling, making hams therefrom etc. The remaining bones may be used for suitable purposes, such as for making gelatinous substances, e.g., glue or gelatine. For such purposes the bones have to be cleaned, which may be done by scraping, by jets of water or other substances, by washing etc., to remove remnants of meat, sinews and the like.
For cheaper types of meat and for smaller animals with a relatively large amount of small bones it is known to separate the meat from the bones by bringing the animals such as poultry as a whole or in pieces in a press having small perforations in one or more walls. Pressing is obtained by a moving plunger or piston or by a rotating worm screw, and thereby the meat is transferred into a paste-like mass, which is thus loosened from the bones and pressed outwards through the perforations, which keep the bones back in the press. During pressing the bones may be fragmented somewhat, or they may be fragmented considerably, e.g., by cutting edges of a worm screw.
In another proposal, which was only published after the filing date of my first application in Holland, trimmed bones or bony carcass portions are first broken or reduced in size and are thereupon treated in a press to extrude the meat in fluidized or paste-like form through perforations in a wall of the press, while keeping back the bone fragments in the press cylinder.